I'm a linear writer. I begin at the beginning, and write straight
through to the end. I don't write scenes out of order, apart from
necessary backfilling and writing new scenes during revision. But in a
first draft, I just run straight through. I've always resisted writing
scenes out of order, because of a fear that I'd wind up writing all
the cool scenes first, the big set-pieces and dramatic moments, and
I'd drag my feet on writing the connective tissue, set-up, build-up,
etc. -- all the elements that make the dramatic moments more
dramatic. I bribe myself with those big flashy cool scenes. I know
they're coming, so I write more quickly and frequently so I can get to
the point where I'm allowed to write them. This linear technique is
also useful, especially in novels, because it helps me prevent my
middles from sagging. I don't want to get bored with the writing
process, so I tend to put cool stuff in the middle to keep myself
excited and engaged. This straight-through approach has always been my
technique, for as long as I can remember.

Except, in the new novel, I'm writing scenes out of order.

Part of it is the weirdness of this whole book. Here's the
background: in 2000, I started a novel called Ferocious
Dreamers, featuring my ass-kicking sorcerer, Marla Mason. I'd
written a couple of stories about her and thought she could sustain a
book. I wrote about 50,000 words of that book... and then crashed and
burned. The novel just went completely off the rails, plotlines
proliferating, loose ends everywhere, no central narrative cohesion,
etc. There were good ideas, good characters, and even a few good
scenes, but it wasn't working as a book. So I trunked it. Then, a
couple of years ago, I wrote Blood Engines, which also features
Marla Mason, and realized it could be the first in a series. So I went
back to Ferocious Dreamers, lopped off the last twenty thousand
words (where things really started to go wrong), rewrote the
first chapter, started excising chunks of it and rearranging other
chunks... and then realized it was dumb to spend that much time on a
sequel when I hadn't even sold the first novel.

Then I sold the first novel. And the sequel, based on an outline
and that revised first chapter (which is no longer actually the first
chapter, but that's the way it goes sometimes). So now I've got about
30,000 words of intermittently usable first draft, and I'm
cherry-picking the good scenes from that, all while writing new
scenes, with new subplots, etc.

So this is already a really odd and non-linear process. It's a
totally different way of writing a novel, for me. Last night I
wrote a scene that takes place the morning after two of my characters
have sex, before I've even written the scene where they meet.
It's not a big fancy set-piece, it's just some dialogue, and sets up
some plot points, and covers some emotional territory. It just felt
like the right scene to write -- it was there, complete in my mind, in
a way the scene of their meeting isn't, yet. Will I go on this way?
Will I wind up with a crazy-quilt I have to stitch together? Will I
settle down into a linear rhythm once I get past the salvageable parts
of the novel into the all-new territory of the last two-thirds? I don't know. We'll see. It's kind of exhilarating, and scary, honestly.